Hi :) I been filing away group game, not that I think anyone will want to do it but it is more for my own amusement during the long lonely nights.

The premise is very basically, a gladiator style game. One on one, and I want the matches to be somewhat short so the rest of the group doesn't get bored.

I was thinking something simple, such as roll a dice each "round" and compare between the two of you. If player a) rolled a 6 and b) rolled a 2 then as they made their posts they would take that into account. so player a would write that he did well in his attacks and player b would reply to those attacks letting a few through since he rolled worse. And first to reach.. x? 15? 20? something would win.

Anyone have any experience in that type of game that can weigh in on if that kind of system would work or if they know of another that would work better.

I personally havent used rules for over 12 years now since my last Rolemaster campaign ended due to me moving to the states. So I am not up to date with what is out there these days.

For character creation, people who were playing the gladiators got a select number of points to be spread around a selection of abilities (Strength, speed, agility, stamina, etc), which would set a base for their characters. Some characters would be given more points than others (Due to experience and whatnot) and they would be given one more point per victory while losing half a point per loss (or having to take one point off every two losses).

The base would be that before the dice rolled, each ability would be compared between the two fighters and whoever had the most strength would get a +1 to their subsequent dice roll, the most speed +1, most Agility +1 and so on, and all that would be added up. I think that in the game we played there was a system where if someone had more strength, agility etc. by a factor of three points or more, they would get +2 to the dice roll. Something like that. Before the fight begins, it would all be tallied up.

The way the fight would go would be that each fighter would have 3 hit points at the start, and they would roll the dice three times (Making it three posts per fight, keeping it short and sweet). With each roll, whoever lost the roll would lose one HP, and whoever has the most hitpoints left by the end of the fight wins. There was a system involving critical strikes where if the winner rolled 20 or more (D20) and the loser rolled 15 or less he or she would lose two HP. Tied die rolls resulted in both fighters losing HP. If the fight is tied at the end of the three rolls, the fighters will roll one more time. If they tie again, the fight is a draw.

If someone wanted to fight an NPC, they could, with the GM playing the part of the NPC. The GM would roll the dice once, and the player's fighter would have to beat that roll at least two out of three times.

If the fighter lost no HP, he or she will have walked out of the fight unscathed. Losing only one would result in light wounds. Losing two are heavy wounds (which might result in loss of points if the fighter fights before the wounds are healed), and losing all three, or ending with 0 HP results in death.

It was a story-based RP, so the system was developed to keep the fights smooth and clean without god-modding. The GM would have to supervise the rolls, and no roll with the GM and both fighters present would be counted, naturally. It was a good system that... I'll be honest, I lost a lot of fighters to, but it felt fair and honest.

I posted this image as a visual aid and to vouch my support for a very easy combat system. This is from the Spartacus boardgame that has frequent gladatorial combat.

To break it down, it is all d6 based.

There are three catagories

AtkDefSpeed

Speed is used as an initiative and for potential range attacks (in the events of a javelin, etc if not in range)

Speed is rolled, and tallied up, highest score is allowed to act first. (Dice in this case, also equal to how far the can move, 3 dice = 15ft (5ft per "step". This is also used to move in and out of range and get into a "flank"

Attacker rolls his atk dice, defender rolls his defend dice.

For every dice the defender doesn't have, a 3 or greater is an auto injury. (remove one dice for one of the three pools)

Example

Atk rolls 3, 5, 1

Defender rolls 6, 2, 1

5 is blocked, 3 beats 2, 1 is blocked

The defender would then lose 1 dice from the three pools. (Their choice) then they can counter attack. Once that is done, they reroll intiative to see who goes first and repeat.

Defeat is when one dice pool is fully depleted, instadeath is when 2 pools are depleted.

Becuase of this, people are careful and evenly remove pools and may even submit before death. With the back and forth of this system, it can open up for some pretty good combat rp.